Chapter 44. I Want to Quit.

[Threat detected]

[Threat Class: Existential]

[Required Action: Elimination]

[Current Threat Rank: 2]

That annoying system window was getting in my way.

It had ruined my stargazing, and now it was keeping me from training properly. I tried to ignore it, but it seemed to be getting brighter and more irritating by the minute.

Fine.

It wasn’t like I had anything to do besides training anyway. Let’s see what this “threat” is.

I teleported into the forest.

…And now what? Where am I supposed to go?

The system window vanished. Instead, a strange sensation appeared—as if something was pointing out the direction I needed to move in.

I followed that feeling and went where it led.

I’d been moving for about an hour in the direction that strange sensation indicated.

But I still hadn’t found the “threat” the system window was talking about.

[Threat detected]

[Threat Class: Existential]

[Required Action: Elimination]

[Current Threat Rank: 3]

That system window again.

Hey, I’m already going where you’re pointing. Stop showing me this quest again.

…Wait.

Something changed.

Yeah. The threat rank was 2 before, and now it’s 3.

So in such a short time, it got stronger?

Damn it. I need to hurry.

I hope it isn’t too far.

Two days.

Damn it, I moved through the forest for two days.

Forty-eight hours.

And not the way normal people do it—walking by day and resting at night. I could rest in the training room.

By an ordinary person’s standards, it would’ve been a full four days. Though honestly, my calculations were probably inaccurate. It’s unlikely an ordinary person could move through the forest at the speed I could.

Yeah, I couldn’t truly go fast—the trees got in the way. But still…

Why the hell didn’t the system find someone closer to this threat?

Why did it have to be me, dragging myself all the way from so far away?

And if there were no people nearby at all, the system could have sent monsters here. It could do that, right?

I don’t know exactly how the system works, but…

It doesn’t feel like it was truly necessary to send me.

So far.

And in general, over these two days, the threat the system showed rose to the fifth rank.

Considering my status window also says I’m rank five, I don’t think this will be as simple as it looks.

And what am I supposed to do if this threat reaches rank six?

Still, judging by the fact that it only recently reached rank five, the next increase should take much longer. With each rank, growth always takes more and more time.

So… judging by the feeling, I’m not that far anymore. Soon I should see this so-called threat.

Oh. I heard something.

I jumped from tree to tree and finally saw the threat.

And… to be honest, it doesn’t look dangerous at all, not the way the system warning made it sound.

Down below, I saw… well… it looked like a giant caterpillar.

A caterpillar with big legs. No—with very big legs. There were a lot of them.

And it was eating a tree.

Not even an animal—it was literally eating a tree. Fast. Crunching. With zero interest in anything else.

Seriously?

Maybe I’m mistaken?

No. I’m not. I can feel it—I’m supposed to destroy this caterpillar.

But why the hell? I dragged myself through the forest for two days just to kill… a caterpillar. Even if it’s huge. There should be monsters in the forest far more dangerous than this.

Although, to be fair, its size is impressive.

In length—clearly more than ten meters.

In width… hard to tell from this distance, but I’d say around one and a half to two meters.

I landed on the ground not far from the caterpillar.

From below, it looked a lot creepier than from above.

Honestly, I didn’t even want to kill this thing. It was just eating trees. Plants.

What am I supposed to do? Kill it?

I even felt a little sorry for it.

Suddenly, the caterpillar stopped and slowly turned in my direction.

Horror.

I didn’t see any eyes. It didn’t even have a face, really. Instead—a huge maw packed with teeth.

Just looking at it made my skin crawl.

It made some sound. Not loud, but clearly threatening.

What, is it… threatening me?

Fine. I’ll finish the quest and get out of here as fast as possible.

I was about to strike first, but it suddenly lunged at me. Fast. Damn it!

I sprang back and leapt up into a tree.

At close range it really is quick, but it doesn’t seem capable of moving like that for long.

And luckily, it can’t climb trees either.

Though…

It stared straight at me. I couldn’t see eyes, but I was sure it was looking right at me.

Then it began gnawing on the tree I was standing on.

Alright.

I drew my sword. This shouldn’t be a problem.

I jumped down and landed right on its body—around where its neck should have been.

The moment I landed, I swung.

The blade sank deep into flesh, almost completely severing its head from its body.

Almost.

My sword wasn’t long enough to cut through all the way.

I quickly retreated, because the monster’s body started thrashing wildly, without any pattern.

Oh!

Its head finally tore free and rolled away.

And the body…

The body kept thrashing.

It reminded me of a lizard’s severed tail—only a thousand times bigger.

The massive body flailed, destroying everything around it: small trees, bushes, plants.

Even the larger trees weren’t spared.

With each slam of its body, trunks cracked, chunks of bark and wood flew in every direction.

In some places it simply tore pieces out of trunks as if they were made of rotten wood.

Its body was frighteningly tough and strong.

But it didn’t matter anymore.

After a while, the movements grew weaker.

A few more convulsive jerks—and the body finally went still.

Well then… I guess the quest is done.

I exhaled. Time to go home. Go home… to nowhere.

I’ll just go back to the training room

and keep training.

[Hostile lifeform defeated: Ramus Mundivori (Rank 4)]

[Gained: +201,890 experience points]

Wait. Rank four?

As far as I remember, the last system window showed a threat of rank five.

So… this wasn’t a single target.

I listened to my senses.

Yeah—that feeling hadn’t gone anywhere. It was still pulling me farther, deeper into the forest.

So there’s more than one of these things here.

Maybe not all of them are caterpillars. Maybe there are other creatures too.

In other words… I was sent to wipe out a group of monsters, not just one.

And then I heard a loud sound—something heavy crashing to the ground.

I think a tree fell.

A huge tree went down somewhere deeper in the forest.

So there’s another monster over there.

I quickly climbed up into a tree and moved on, jumping from branch to branch, from tree to tree. It’s safer that way. And honestly, I like it more.

The farther I went, the more sounds I heard.

One after another.

Heavy thuds of falling trees.

What the hell is going on over there?

As those sounds drew nearer, others joined them—quieter, but clear.

The sound of something gnawing on wood.

Exactly the same sound as the caterpillar I had just killed.

But now there were many such sounds.

Very many.

I froze and looked closely.

There was one caterpillar. The same as before, only a bit smaller.

A second one—a little farther.

A third one—even farther.

And then I saw it.

Damn… now that is a monster.

A huge caterpillar, about three times larger than the one I killed. It moved slowly through the forest, literally devouring the trees in its path.

And it looked like there were a lot of caterpillars here.

At the very least, within my field of view I counted no fewer than twenty.

And considering how hard it is to see deep into the forest, there had to be many more.

A bit farther on, I noticed a massive tree—a true giant, far taller and thicker than the rest.

The sounds of trees falling came from even deeper in the forest, and I decided to climb up there to see what the hell was happening.

I probably won’t be able to see everything—the crowns and leaves will block the view.

But it’s worth trying.

Suddenly, the tree I was standing on began to fall. I managed to leap to the neighboring one at the last moment. Though honestly, even if I had fallen, I probably wouldn’t have been seriously injured.

But falling right down into those caterpillars… whatever the system called them, I already don’t remember… I didn’t want that.

I’m not scared.

Well… almost not scared.

Alright. I jumped quickly through the trees, reached the biggest one, and started climbing, trying to get as high as possible.

When I reached the top, I looked out to see what was happening deeper in the forest.

The first thought that came to my mind was simple:

“System, I quit.”

That’s what I would like to say.

What I saw deeper in the forest was a vast space.

Empty.

Empty of plants.

As far as the eye could see—not a single blade of grass.

No bushes. No trees.

It was a circular area.

By my estimate—about two kilometers in diameter.

And that circle was still growing.

With every minute.

Well, when I called this place empty, I phrased it wrong.

They were there.

The caterpillars.

Many.

Very many.

Thousands?

No… tens of thousands.

They filled the entire space, devouring the trees along the edge, expanding that dead zone farther and farther into the forest.

And in the very center of all of it was something.

At first glance, it looked like a gigantic root system—in the center there was some massive thickened core instead of a trunk.

That core, by my estimate, was about 150 meters in diameter, and from it in all directions stretched thick, intertwined offshoots that looked like roots.

Although…

To hell with it. I’m probably wrong to call those roots.

And then it felt like the tree beneath me swayed slightly.

I looked down—

and saw three damn caterpillars.

They were biting into the trunk of this enormous tree from three sides, methodically eating it. The tree was visibly wobbling, as if it was holding on by sheer will.

Only a few seconds passed—

and a loud crack rang out as the trunk broke.

The tree began to fall.

With me on it.

—Damn…